The invention relates to a front-face support for a motor vehicle.
It is current practice nowadays, when assembling a motor vehicle, to put various components in place at the front of it, such as lighting units, heat exchangers, audible warning devices, hood lock, in the form of a subassembly in which these components are fixed onto a support known as front-face support. Such a subassembly can be produced by an equipment manufacturer, and the automobile constructor has only to offer it up at the front of the vehicle and to fix the front-face support onto the structural elements of the vehicle, thus indirectly fixing the components carried by the front-face support, without needing to handle or fix these components individually onto the structure of the vehicle. This constitutes a considerable simplification in the operations of assembling the vehicle.
EP 0 658 470 A describes such a front-face support comprising a body made of plastic overmolded onto a metal reinforcement made from stamped sheet metal.
Reinforcement is necessary in order to confer on the front-face support the mechanical strength required to allow stable fixing of the components which it carries. However, producing a reinforcement implies expensive operations of stamping and of anti-corrosion protection.
The object of the invention is to dispense with these operations, and thus to simplify the production of the front-face support and make it more economical.
According to the invention, there is provided a front-face support suitable for supporting a multiplicity of components of a motor vehicle and for being fixed to the front end of the vehicle, comprising a plastic body overmolded onto a reinforcement enhancing the mechanical strength of the support, wherein the reinforcement comprises a multiplicity of elongate elements in the form of mutually combined filaments or fibers.
Optional, complementary or alternative characteristics of embodiments of the invention are set out below:
the said elongate elements are combined to form at least one layer of fabric,
the said elongate elements are mineral fibers,
the said mineral fibers are made of a material chosen from carbon and glass,
the said elongate elements are combined to form at least one cable,
the said elongate elements are steel wires.